The mayor of Sevilla has accused Vox of stoking division over a planned mosque in the city’s Poligono Sur district.

Jose Luis Sanz made the comments after the city council formally approved the mosque’s building permit on Tuesday.

He defended the development and insisted Sevilla has a long history of religious coexistence.

‘There are also Evangelical and Mormon churches in Sevilla. They don’t have a problem with those,’ Sanz said. ‘So what is being questioned? The religion or the race?’

He added: ‘This city has been Jewish, Christian and Muslim for centuries.’

Sanz noted that Sevilla already has 14 mosques, with 35 across the wider province, pointing to one in Ponce de Leon that sits beside a Catholic church and a Holy Week brotherhood headquarters.

‘It is an example of coexistence and the diversity that this city has enjoyed for years,’ he said.

The comments come after Vox stepped up its campaign against the project, warning last week that it would be ‘almost impossible’ to continue supporting the PP-led local government if it backed the mosque.

The party also joined a protest against the development on Monday, where neo-Nazis were also present, and has threatened to take legal action to stop the project.

Sanz urged politicians to lower the temperature of the debate.

‘When people create social alarm or make calls to hatred, hatred eventually arrives,’ he said.

‘This government will always respect the law 100% and stay far away from the hatred that others promote.’

He also criticised Vox directly.

‘Vox must understand that ideology is not above the law, not here at Sevilla City Hall or anywhere else,’ he said.

‘I’ve been managing public money for 18 years. I have never broken the law and I never will.’

The mayor stressed that municipal technicians had approved the mosque project and that the council was legally obliged to grant the licence.

Meanwhile, Vox’s local leader Gonzalo Garcia de Polavieja announced the party would cancel a scheduled meeting on Wednesday to review its governing agreement with the PP, claiming it was rapidly losing confidence in Sanz’s administration.

Sanz dismissed the criticism, insisting the coalition agreement had never included any provision allowing Vox to influence planning decisions.

‘I don’t see anything in our agreement with Vox about jointly approving building permits or anything relating to mosques,’ he said.

‘It could become the first political agreement in Spain’s democratic history to collapse because a government complied with the law. Strange things happen.’

Read more Andalucia news at the Spanish Eye.